History of Siberia. The development and development of Siberia

Behind the great Stone Belt, the Urals, stretched the vast expanses of Siberia. This territory occupies almost three-fourths of the entire area of our country. Siberia is larger than the second largest (after Russia) state of the world - Canada. More than twelve million square kilometers keep in their bowels inexhaustible reserves of natural resources, with the reasonable use of sufficient for the life and prosperity of many generations of people.

Trekking the Stone Belt

The beginning of the development of Siberia falls on the last years of the reign of Ivan the Terrible. The most convenient outpost for moving inland into this wild and uninhabited region at that time was the Middle Urals, the undivided owner of which was the family of merchants Stroganovs. Taking advantage of the protection of the Moscow kings, they owned vast land areas, on which there were thirty-nine villages and the city of Solvychegodsk with a monastery. They also owned a chain of jails, stretched along the border with the possessions of Khan Kuchum.

The history of Siberia, or rather, its conquest by the Russian Cossacks, began with the fact that the tribes that inhabited it refused to pay the Russian tsar a yasik - a tribute to which they were taxed for many years. Moreover, the nephew of their ruler - Khan Kuchum - with a large detachment of cavalry made a series of raids on the villages belonging to Stroganov. To protect against such unwanted guests, rich merchants hired Cossacks, led by the ataman Basil Timofeevich Alenin, nicknamed Ermak. Under this name, he entered into Russian history.

The first steps in the unexplored region

In September 1582, a detachment of seven hundred and fifty people began their legendary campaign for the Urals. This was a kind of discovery of Siberia. On all the way the Cossacks were lucky. The Tatars, who inhabited those regions, although they surpassed them by their numbers, but were inferior militarily. They practically did not know the firearms so widespread by that time in Russia, and fled in panic every time they heard the volley.

Towards the Russians, the khan expelled his nephew Mametkul with a ten thousand strong army. The battle took place near the river Tobol. Despite their numerical superiority, the Tatars suffered a crushing defeat. Cossacks, developing success, came very close to the khan's capital, Kashlik, and here they finally crushed the enemies. The former ruler of the region fled, and his warlike nephew was taken prisoner. Since that day, the khanate has practically ceased to exist. The history of Siberia is making a new turn.

Contractions with aliens

In those days, the Tatars were subject to a large number of tribes, subjugated by them and who were their tributaries. Money they did not know, and their yasik paid skins of fur-bearing animals. Since the defeat of Kuchum, these peoples have passed under the rule of the Russian Tsar, and the convoys with sables and martens have been dragged to distant Moscow. This valuable product has always and everywhere been in great demand, and especially in the European market.

However, not all tribes reconciled with the inevitable. Some of them continued their resistance, although every year it was weakened. The Cossack detachments continued their march. In 1584 their legendary ataman Ermak Timofeevich perished. This happened, as is often the case in Russia, for negligence and oversight - on one of the halts did not put sentries. It so happened that a prisoner who had escaped a few days before had led a detachment of the enemy at night. Using the oversight of the Cossacks, they suddenly attacked and began to cut the sleeping people. Ermak, trying to escape, jumped into the river, but the massive shell - Ivan Grozny's personal gift - took him to the bottom.

Life in the conquered territory

Since that time, the active development of Western Siberia began. Following the Cossack detachments, hunters, peasants, clergy and, of course, bureaucrats were pulled into the taiga wilderness. All those who found themselves behind the Ural ridge became free people. Here there was no serfdom, no landownership. Only the state-defined tax was paid. Local tribes, as mentioned above, were taxed with a fur hat. During this period, revenues from receipt of the treasury from Siberian furs were a significant contribution to the Russian budget.

The history of Siberia is inextricably linked with the creation of a system of jails - defensive fortifications (around which, by the way, many cities subsequently grew), which served as outposts for further conquest of the region. So, in 1604 the city of Tomsk was laid, which later became the largest economic and cultural center. Shortly there were Kuznetsk and Yenisei jails. In them, the military garrisons and the administration that controlled the gathering of the ash were located.

Documents of those years testify to many facts of corruption of representatives of the authorities. Despite the fact that according to the law all furs had to go to the treasury, some officials, as well as Cossacks directly engaged in collecting tribute, overstated the established norms, appropriating the difference in their favor. Even then, such lawlessness was severely punished, and many cases are known when covetous people paid for their deeds of freedom and even their lives.

Further penetration into new lands

Especially intensive the process of colonization became after the end of the Time of Troubles. The goal of all who dared to seek happiness in the new, unexplored areas, was this time Eastern Siberia. This process was very rapid, and by the end of the XVII century the Russians had reached the shores of the Pacific Ocean. By this time, a new government structure appeared - the Siberian Order. His duties included the establishment of new orders for the administration of the territories under control and the nomination of the voivode, who were the authorized representatives of the tsarist government on the ground.

In addition to the clear collection of furs, the purchase of fur was also made, the calculation for which was waged not by money, but by all sorts of goods: axes, saws, various tools, and fabrics. The history, unfortunately, and here has kept many cases of abuse. Quite often the arbitrariness of bureaucrats and Cossack sergeants ended in riots of local residents, pacifying them with force.

Main directions of colonization

Eastern Siberia was developed in two main directions: north along the coast of the seas, and south along the line of borders with the countries adjacent to it. At the beginning of the XVII century, the Irtysh and Ob rivers were inhabited by Russians, and after them significant areas adjacent to the Yenisei. Such cities as Tyumen, Tobolsk and Krasnoyarsk were laid and started to be built. All of them were to eventually become major industrial and cultural centers.

Further advancement of the Russian colonists was carried out mainly along the Lena River. Here in 1632 a prison was laid, which gave rise to the city of Yakutsk - the most important for those times the strong point in the further development of the northern and eastern territories. In many ways, thanks to this, two years later the Cossacks led by Ivan Moskvin managed to reach the coast of the Pacific Ocean, and soon Russian explorers first saw the Kuriles and Sakhalin.

Conquerors of the Wild Edge

The history of Siberia and the Far East keeps the memory of another outstanding traveler - Cossack Semyon Dezhnev. In 1648, he and the detachment he led on several ships for the first time rounded the coast of North Asia and proved the existence of the strait that separates Siberia from America. At the same time, another traveler, Poyarov, passing along the southern border of Siberia and climbing up the Amur reached the Sea of Okhotsk.

After a while Nerchinsk was founded. Its significance is largely determined by the fact that as a result of the eastward advance the Cossacks approached China, which also claimed these territories. By that time, the Russian Empire had reached its natural boundaries. During the next century, there was a steady process of consolidating the results achieved during the colonization.

Legislative acts related to new territories

The history of Siberia in the 19th century is characterized mainly by the abundance of administrative innovations introduced into the life of the region. One of the earliest was the division of this vast territory into two generals-governorships, approved in 1822 by the decree of Alexander I. The center of the Western became Tobolsk, and the Eastern one - Irkutsk. They, in turn, were subdivided into gubernias, and those - to volost and alien councils. Such a transformation was a consequence of the famous reform of MM Speranskii.

In the same year, ten legislative acts signed by the tsar and regulating all aspects of administrative, economic and legal life were published. Much attention was paid in this document to issues related to the arrangement of places of detention and the procedure for serving time limits for imprisonment. By the nineteenth century, katorga and jails became an integral part of this region.

Siberia on the map of those years abounds with the names of mines, the work in which was conducted exclusively by the forces of the convicts. This is Nerchinskiy, Zabaikalsky, and Blagodatny and many others. As a result of a large influx of exiles from among the Decembrists and participants in the Polish insurgency in 1831, the government even united all the Siberian provinces under the supervision of a specially formed gendarmerie district.

The beginning of the province's industrialization

Of the main industries, which were widely developed during this period, it is worth noting primarily the extraction of gold. By the middle of the century, it accounted for most of the entire volume of precious metal mined in the country. Also, large revenues to the state treasury came from the mining industry, which greatly increased the volume of mining by that time. Many other branches also develop.

In the new century

At the beginning of the 20th century, the push for the further development of the region was the construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway. The history of Siberia in the post-revolutionary period is full of drama. A monstrous scourge of fratricidal war swept through its expanses, resulting in the liquidation of the White movement and the establishment of Soviet power. During the Great Patriotic War, many industrial and military enterprises are evacuated to this region. In connection with this, the population of many cities sharply increases.

It is known that only during the period 1941-1942. Here came more than a million people. In the post-war period, when numerous giant plants, power stations and railway lines were built, there was also noted a significant influx of visitors - all those for whom the new homeland became Siberia. On the map of this vast region appeared names that became symbols of the era - the Baikal-Amur Mainline, the Bratsk Hydroelectric Power Plant, the Novosibirsk Academgorodok and much more.